DATE FOUNDED
January 2016
LOCATION
Baltimore MD, Washington DC
COMPANY SIZE
7
FUN FACT
Founders Nathan and Ben had been thinking about a startup for a few years while still in an academic lab and finishing up their PhDs. They went to a lawyer and founded the company a week after Ben graduated.
Their mission:
Commercializing a best in class treatment for patients suffering from knee pain, but not yet ready for knee replacement.
Rethinking joint health
Nanochon sits at the intersection of biotechnology, materials science, and preventive medicine. What first inspired you to pursue this path, and what critical gap did you see in orthopedic care that led to the creation of Nanochon?
We both were working in the same lab, Dr Grace Zhang’s tissue engineering lab at The George Washington University. Both had personal experience with the problem; Ben’s dad was a high school and collegiate athlete that struggled with knee OA his whole life, and Nathan has had multiple surgeries to his knee due to injury and follow on OA issues. We could clearly see the long gap, usually decades, between problems developing, worsening, and eventual knee replacement. But while working in academia, they both took note of the numerous academic research projects that were too costly, too hard to scale, and too variable in clinical performance to make it to market. The seeds of Nanochon were sown; and we began to focus on technologies like advanced polymers and next gen manufacturing that could address the scientific, clinical and practical challenges, to inform a product that could benefit patients, surgeons and the healthcare system simultaneously.
Turning Science into Faster, Scalable Treatment
Your Chondrograft™ implant blends regenerative tissue growth with mechanical support, a rare combination. How does this change recovery for patients, and what makes it scalable for broader adoption?
Dramatically. Currently, standard of care and even cutting edge biological treatments require long and involved recovery for patients. Typically after these surgeries, patients have to be completely off of their knee in crutches and a brace for an average of 6 weeks, but it can be as much as 8 or 12. Ultimate healing also takes a long time, 8 to 12 months for patients to be considered fully healed and to be able to return to full activity. With our product, a patient can be back on their feet right after surgery. Clinical trials will prove this out, but based on our pre-clinical work we think patients will be fully recovered and back to living their lives in half the time or less.
UNMET NEEDS:
Currently, younger patients suffering from cartilage damage have limited treatment options and require a long-term solution that could help them avoid knee replacement all together.
SOLUTION:
Chondrograft™ is a patented, synthetic, packaged and shelf stable, inserted with a short, minimally invasive procedure creating a highly cost-effective treatment option.
The economics of better outcomes
Many patients with cartilage damage face costly surgeries or lifelong complications. How does Nanochon’s technology improve both clinical outcomes and economic outcomes, for patients, insurers, and healthcare systems?
I love answering this question, in several parts:
- The immediate cost of the device is much less than existing treatments. Cadaveric graft tissue, one of the leading options, costs around $15k, and alternative cell therapies can cost as much as $60k, and that’s just for the treatment, not the surgery. Nanochon’s technology has simple cheap COGS, and we plan to retail around $4,000, the average cost of a knee replacement.
- Shorter recovery time can lessen the costs of PT and pain medication, but the first big cost savings come with revision rates. The surgical standard of care, something called microfracture, fails at a rate of around 85% at 2 years after surgery. And a majority of patients receiving existing treatments progress to needing a knee replacement 5 years later. Avoiding that second surgery and even a knee replacement, each of which cost around $50k for the procedure, represents a tremendous savings to payers, not to mention keeping patients out of the OR.
From prototype to proof
What have been your most significant milestones so far, in product validation, trials, or partnerships, and what upcoming inflection points should investors or strategic partners be watching for?
We were very proud of our recently published and presented pre-clinical work, demonstrating Chondrograft™’s potential to repair cartilage defects and preserve healthy joint function. We have also done a lot of work over the last year+ to design and refine the implant itself and the surgical tools, giving surgeons an easy to use and optimized procedure. We partnered with Genesis Innovations, a seasoned medical device commercialization firm to accomplish this result. We were also very proud to receive clearance from Health Canada (their FDA) to start our first clinical trial.
Beginning that trial, and collecting the first data readouts is the next exciting step for us. Expect announcements about that soon, and into mid next year.
A vision for regenerative healthcare
Looking five years ahead, what does success look like for Nanochon, and how could your technology change the way we think about joint health and quality of life?
If everything goes as planned, the product will be on the market, backed by strong clinical data, and will already have been used by some surgeons. That could also be a particularly exciting time because by then, we will have the 4-5 year post-op data from the very first patients, pointing to the potential to reduce those revisions rates and follow-on joint replacement procedures I talked about.
Also by then, we hope to have strong data from a diversity of patients, showing that we can have a benefit for people at many different stages of damage to the joint, showing we are a broad solution for many, not just a few.
You’re operating in a highly specialized corner of the healthcare innovation landscape. What kind of strategic or investment partnerships does Nanochon look for as it scales?
It depends on the stage, but I think the key is bringing on investors as well as partners that can add value and help you reach the next critical milestone. For us now, that is groups that can help execute clinical trials, and create a clear path towards M&A.
